Homeland Security: Pro-Life a Threat

WASHINGTON — For Father Frank
Pavone, the federal government’s targeting of pro-lifers is nothing new.

“It’s déjà vu all over again,” said
Father Pavone, national director of Priests for Life. “We saw these types of
tactics under President Clinton.”

This time, it’s in the form of the
Department of Homeland Security’s warnings about “right-wing extremism.”

On April 7, the department’s Office
of Intelligence and Analysis produced an assessment on the threat of right-wing
extremism in the United States. The purpose of the document was to alert law
enforcement agencies about the possible threat of right-wing extremist groups
that may, according to the assessment, be gaining new recruits by “playing on
their fears about several emergent issues.”

The document’s language is vague and
broad. Throughout the assessment, the label “right-wing extremist” is used to
describe troops returning from overseas, white supremacists, and those “groups
and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to
abortion.”

Perhaps the strangest assertion made
in the assessment is that white supremacist groups might use social issues like
abortion to recruit new members.

This claim comes as a surprise to
Pastor Walter Hoye, a black pro-life leader, founder and CEO of the Issues for
Life Foundation in Berkley, Calif. Hoye recently served 19 days in jail for
standing in front of an abortion clinic in Oakland.

The
document’s language concerning white supremacist groups “is a deliberate
attempt to silence the pro-life movement,” Hoye said. “The accusations in this
assessment are not connected to any documented evidence. We in the pro-life
movement are not right-wing extremists nor are we controlled by the same. I am
very disappointed in my government. I have often said that if anyone wants to
bring the pro-life movement to an end all that they would need to do is show
that what is inside the womb is not a baby, a living human being.”

Joe Scheidler, national director of
the Pro-Life Action League, echoed Father Pavone: “What is most disappointing
about this assessment is that there is nothing violent about the pro-life
movement. Yes, there have been a few nuts who have hurt people, but pro-lifers
are the most peaceful people in the country.”

“But,” he pointed out, “what you
need to understand is that in the minds of pro-abortionists like this current
administration even asking a woman more than once if she wants to talk about
abortion is violent.”

In 1986, the National Organization
of Women filed a complaint in federal court that said Scheidler and others were
violating anti-trust laws and the Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations
Act. After a 19-year court battle that went all the way to the U.S. Supreme
Court, Scheidler won the case.

Judie Brown, president of American Life League, had a
stronger reaction to the assessment. “We have known that the Obama
administration was and is going to do everything possible to suppress the
pro-life movement. Secretary [Janet]Napolitano is avidly
pro-abortion like her boss. She can characterize us as terrorists — much like
NARAL (National Abortion Rights Action League) has been doing for years, but we
must stand our ground.”

“I am not surprised,” said Father
Pavone. “Something like this was to be expected, because pro-abortion
administrations like Obama’s are highly influenced by the pro-abortion industry
itself. The abortion industry really believes that we have a vast network that
is connected to terrorists.”

He added: “We do not.”

Frankly, he said, Homeland Security
has it all backwards. “The notion that it is okay to end a life to solve a
problem is the essence of abortion itself.”

Other
black pro-life leaders are also angered by the assessment’s suggestion that
“pro-life” goes hand in hand with “right-wing extremist.”

“It is outrageous: the very thought
that this woman would compare people who care about the lives of children with
terrorists,” said Day Gardner, founder and director of the National Black
Pro-Life Union.

Concerning
the notion that pro-lifers could be recruited by white supremacists, Gardner
noted, “When people think of pro-life activists, they tend to think of people who
are white, Republican, and, for the most part, Catholic. This assessment
provides an opportunity to let the country know that there are thousands of
blacks out there who feel strongly about the lives of unborn children. We must
let the nation know that the true face of the pro-life movement is multiracial,
multicultural, and cuts across all color and ethnic lines.”

Painting pro-lifers with a giant
federal-sized brush, the assessment also intimates that those who favor states’
rights may be members of right-wing extremist groups or susceptible to
recruitment by such groups.

Said Scheidler, “What they are doing
is targeting groups which have been successful in passing state laws which
oppose abortion. We as a pro-life community have passed some 500 state laws
curtailing abortion — abortions paid for and promoted by the federal
government.”

Backpedaling

Homeland Security has had to do some
significant backpedaling over the furor caused by the assessment.

“The Department of Homeland Security
is on the lookout for criminal and terrorist activity. We do not, nor will we
ever, monitor ideological or political beliefs,” said Amy Kudwa, a department
spokeswoman. “The secretary has acknowledged publicly that sections of this
document could have been written more artfully.”

What might be the effect of the
assessment on the pro-life community? Scheidler notes that if the Obama
administration had hoped to scare people off from the movement, it is not
working: “People are coming to us in droves.”

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